"Safety does not come first. Art, truth and beauty come first."

If only every night were like this one…

There was a burst of lightning, illuminating the bedroom, I see flashes of paintings on the wall, the white cat sleeping on the clothes strewn on the floor. But the thunder dragged far behind – the storm was still far off, down the valley.

It is so dark I cannot see even my hand in front of my face.

Had it been the lightning that woke me? In my sleep-fog I had thought there was something else.

Another flash. And then pure darkness.

There it is! Suddenly alert!

Coyotes up in the hills, calling to the storm? Collecting the family to the den? The low growl of our dog from the porch, just outside our window.

The coyotes yip in waves, fade away, call again.

Last night we had stood outside in the wonder of a vast domed roof of northern lights and chirping frogs. A great white campfire that flamed and ebbed across the northern horizon. Waves of white flames, ghosts escaping into the universe.

Flash! Bam! My partner stirs from her deep slumber beside me.

“What was that?” she says, not waking.

Thunder, I say softly. There’s a storm coming.

“Yum”, she says, and snuggles in close to me. The other cat, on the pillow beside her, begins to purr.

Northern lights and thunderstorms.

I hear the rain coming up the valley. A hiss. A tapdance on the barn roof.

A breeze blows up, bringing in the window the smell of fresh lilacs, just off the porch.

I fall asleep feeling like a child, safe in my wonderment, a harmony of awe and fragrant peace; God’s eternity caught in the palms of my hands, five minutes before daybreak.